The Blood She Spilled
by The Silver Trumpet
Summary: In Death's Paws: BalloonClan Challenge. Applefern has waited years to seek revenge. M for gore-don't read if you're weak-stomached!


Moonlight shown down upon the camp. The surreal light cast the grass a silver hue, though the sky was blackened, with Silverpelt barely peeking through the clouds. Crickets were humming and chirping their own melodic tune. Frogs could be heard, lowing along with them. Trees creaked and swayed with the slight warm breeze. A storm was blowing in, but none minded. After all, they were all asleep in their cozy nests, warm with moss and pelts and scents of loved ones. The ones nested closest to the nursery could smell the milk, and it comforted them away from nightmares, though none of them would ever admit it.

A warrior rolled over, spilling into a vacant nest. That particular nest should not have been vacant but, after all, the warrior was asleep, and who minded if a clanmate sneaked out every once in a while? It was just more room in their generally over-crowded den. In fact, all of the warriors liked it when someone sneaked out. They didn't care if the missing warrior had left to become a rogue or was collaborating with enemy clans; they couldn't care less if the warrior was simply going on a midnight hunt. Space was space!

But the owner of the vacant nest was Applefern. Applefern, once upon a dream, was a kind, loving, fair, beautiful she-cat. Envied throughout the clans, she was the longing of many toms, some from her clan, some not. But, long ago, Applefern had been interested in only one tom. Nightfire. The handsome black tom from two nests over, oh, he was the desire of her pretty heart. And, though no one would ever have guessed it, her heart was made of glass. Soon after they became mates, she was expecting kits. She moved into the nursery, so pleased with her life. But the battle happened, as battles do, and Nightfire was killed. Nightfire, Nightfire, the love of her life, had gone to Silverpelt, and she was helplessly stuck with two kits. A she-cat, as beautiful as Nightfire had been handsome, whom she named Shadekit, and a tom. This tom, though, was not nearly as handsome as she'd imagined her kits. He was long-limbed, with an unnaturally long tail, and his paws were a muddy brown, though the rest of him was black. She appropriately named him Spiderkit, and decided that there was a bad apple in every bunch. She suckled both of her kits, made sure to keep them healthy and happy. And she was happy.

She was happy. Truly. Until three moons after the birth of her kits, when she awoke in the depth of the night to find her kits—both the beauty and the spider—missing! She had a fit. She yowled and yowled. And, unfortunately, at the dawn, her kits were found by a fox's nest. Spiderkit was injured, but not gravely. Shadekit's remains had to be pieced together for vigil and burial. Applefern was crushed. She couldn't bear it. Her beauty, her kit, her daughter was dead. Blaming Spiderkit, she cast him out of the nest and returned to her warrior duties.

But she'd never returned to her duties. Not really. She'd done it as a disguise. Because her real plan? Her real plan was vengeance. Vengeance on her mate, vengeance on her daughter, vengeance on the son she should have had. Vengeance on the son she'd wanted versus the hideous, pathetic, useless one she received. Her thoughts were consumed with her rage and frustration—moons of it!—as she crept nearer the medicine den, where Spiderpaw and his mentor, Aspenlight, slept peacefully. She could hear his unappealing snores reaching through the brambles.

Silently, she bent back some of the thorny brambles. Having been in the nursery with Aspenlight, she knew the medicine cat slept like a rock. Having suckled Spiderpaw, she knew the medicine cat apprentice wouldn't awake in the heat of a battle. With a smug smirk of her grand intelligence, she kept pulling at the bush, trying her best to get a cat-sized hole there. It wasn't long before she was sitting on the moss next to him. She watched him breathe. Watched his ugly brown paws twitch as he shared a dream, perhaps one with StarClan. Then, fury awakened, she launched herself at him with a blood-curdling screech of utter hatred.

Black and brown fur tore from the apprentice. Warriors rushed from their dens. Aspenlight shot straight up into the air, but cowardice overtook as she realized that the attacker was in her very den. She pelted outside. She hadn't smelled anything, but the knowledge that the attacker—maybe more than one—was in her den was enough for her to shriek, "In the medicine den! They're in the medicine den!"

Hawkfire shot into the den as though being chased. He was being chased; two senior warriors were in hot pursuit. Applefern's writhing form was dragged out with blood thick and sticky on her paws. Her pelt was unkempt and greasy. It had been for moons, escaping the other cats' notice. For the young, beautiful Applefern was gone, replaced by this hideous, beastly, angry, vicious, sadistic monster that had violated the warrior code through attacking her own clanmate with all intention of killing him. Had she? Had she killed him? She couldn't be sure. It'd all been such a blur.

Aspenlight, however, was determined to find out. She shot into the den and dragged him out into the open to examine him. Though his eyes were bright, blood was pouring. His tail had nearly been severed off. His vocal cords were severed. He struggled to breathe through the blood. Intestines dribbled out of his slashed belly. "Spiderpaw!" the medicine cat whimpered. Young herself, she had never seen injuries of this kind before in her life. She tried to push his innards back into his body. "Spiderpaw. You're going to be okay, Spiderpaw! You're going to be okay!" She reached for cobwebs, but stared uselessly at him torn body. No wound was more deep or serious than another. They were all mortal wounds. Starlight reflected in his eyes for a split moment before a final breath left his lungs. "Spiderpaw…" She leaned forward and licked his eyes closed.

A few yards away, an argument was ensuing. Applefern. To kill her, or not to kill her? That was the question. When Brackenstar finally spoke, he was too indecisive. Hawkfire, as unable to restrain his passionate anger as the former queen had been, flung himself at her and killed her.

Nightfire greeted his son in StarClan with his daughter playing innocently around his paws. Applefern never appeared there. And the three of them were glad to confess that they were definitely happy without her.


End file.
